Regents halt UGA expansion plan

Following through on an old promise to cap mushrooming growth, state leaders have put the brakes on a tentative plan to expand the University of Georgia student body by 5,000 students by 2007.

The state Board of Regents has capped the university's enrollment at 32,500 in 2002 until further funds come to support the strained infrastructure at the state's largest university.

''That seems to be the place to be for now,'' James Muyskens, senior vice chancellor for academic affairs, said Tuesday. ''It doesn't mean it would stay at that size.''

Regents released figures last week projecting 10 percent enrollment growth at 32 of the 34 colleges and universities in the University System but capping UGA growth at 32,500 in 2002, a 5.4 percent jump in attendance from this year.

The enrollment targets also stop expansion at Bainbridge College at 1,214 the same year.

Regent Edgar Rhodes of Bremen said that the current pace of growth at the flagship university, fueled by skyrocketing applications, made regents rethink the earlier, provisional decision to let the school continue to grow.

''They are just about at capacity; they're going to have to do something,'' Rhodes said. ''At times they have as many as 12,000 applications and something over 3,000 freshmen.''

''If they don't put a lid on it, the city of Athens is going to have to do a lot, as well as the university,'' he said.

The decision follows up on a tentative 1997 plan under former UGA President Charles Knapp to grow UGA from 30,000 to 32,500 by 2002, and onward to 35,000 by 2007, provided state funding is healthy. The growth scheme has played a role in university plans to improve housing, expand study space and possibly add four new colleges.

More than just a bid for continued state support, the provisional cap means that regents truly want to insure that the ''quality and character need not change'' at the state's largest university, said Muyskens, calling himself a moderate in the perennial debate over how much to expand the size of the UGA student body.

''If we simply pile more people on, we could lose that quality,'' he said.

Muyskens said that campus leaders wanted the break in expansion.

''Any growth that we do undertake should be primarily in the graduate area,'' which remains low at 22 percent of the student body, UGA spokesman Tom Jackson said Tuesday. ''Our large campus is approaching the outer limits of largeness.''

Rhodes emphasized that the new cap doesn't signal waning state support for the university and its eventual expansion, pointing to a new $43 million student learning center approved by the state legislature last session.

Another regent said the new numbers merely reflect one more step in constantly evolving attendance plans. Regents approved the pause in the growth to consider whether Athens and the system can provide reasonable class sizes, appropriate faculty-student ratios and adequate study space and amenities.

''It's nothing new and exciting,'' said Regent Glenn White of Lawrenceville. ''I don't think it's any departure. At some point there's a point of diminishing returns. You have to make sure you keep offering a good product to consumers, which are our students.''

As a result of the cap, the state's two-year schools might see more applications from students seeking college admittance after being turned down by UGA, Rhodes said.

But how to attract Georgia seniors to the smaller state universities remains to be seen. Most Georgia universities and colleges did not meet enrollment targets this fall.

The university system is considering a statewide application for Georgia high school students that would automatically put students rejected by UGA under consideration for admittance to other state colleges, ''so they don't out of frustration go to Auburn,'' Muyskens said.

''Most of the two-year institutions are not at capacity,'' Rhodes said. ''What we're interested in doing now is using what we have already.''